Pope's resignation a surprise to Vermonters

Feb. 11, 2013

Monsignor Bernard Bourgeois, principal of Rice Memorial High School in South Burlington, reacts to the announcement of Pope Benedict XVI's resignation on Monday, February 11, 2013. / GLENN RUSSELL/FREE PRESS

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Free Press Staff Writer

In this photo provided by the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, Pope Benedict XVI delivers his message during a meeting of Vatican cardinals, at the Vatican, Monday. Benedict XVI announced Monday that he would resign Feb. 28 - the first pontiff to do so in nearly 600 years. The decision sets the stage for a conclave to elect a new pope before the end of March. / AP Photo/L'Osservatore Romano, ho

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Two parish secretaries in Vermont, one in Winooski and one in the Northeast Kingdom, say they were surprised by the news Monday morning that Pope Benedict XVI would resign at the end of the month.

He will be the first pope in 600 years to resign in office, making his decision a shock for many Roman Catholics.

“It hasn’t been done in such a long time, I don’t think I’ve absorbed it yet,” said Diane Potvin, parish secretary at St. Francis Xavier Church in Winooski. “I don’t know what to think.”

Benedict said Monday he lacks the strength to fulfill his duties.

At St. Paul’s Church in Barton, Irene LeBlanc, a lifelong member of St. Paul’s Church, said she was informed of the news by one of the teachers at the parochial school connected to the church. She was making breakfast for students when she learned of the pope’s announcement.

Even for a parish in a small town in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont — part of a four-church affiliation called Most Holy Trinity Parish — it matters who the pope is, LeBlanc said.

“He’s the head of our church, he’s the head of the Catholic religion,” LeBlanc said. “Now we have to go into the process of getting another pope.”

The qualities she thinks are most important in his successor are honesty and moral authority, LeBlanc said. The pope should be a “moral upstanding person,” she said. “A holy person.”

Bishop Salvatore Matano, head of the state’s Roman Catholic Diocese, issued a statement about the pope’s decision to retire.

He described it as a demonstration “of his extraordinary love for the Church and her cornerstone, Jesus Christ. Placing the proclamation of the Gospel and the salvation of souls above all else, His Holiness accepts in humility that his age and health do not permit him to fulfill his duties of his office as he would wish.”

Monsignor Bernard Bourgeois, principal of Rice Memorial High School in South Burlington, called the pope’s decision to retire “courageous.” Noting the long-standing tradition that Europeans — popes and monarchs — die in office, Bourgeois said he admired Benedict’s courage in facing that he is no longer capable of the demands of the position.

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“I think he’s been a great pope,” Bourgeois said. “He’s a deep thinker and he’s got a great love of the church and the people.”

Benedict’s eight-year tenure coincided with continuing revelations of — and focus on — a sex abuse scandal within the Catholic Church. Bourgeois, principal of the 380-student school, said he didn’t know how the 85-year-old pope faced “individual cases” of abuse, but he felt the pope’s overall response could be understood by his generation.

“I think he responded to the scandal in the same way most people of his age and generation did,” Bourgeois, 43, said.

“But I strongly believe that he would not want any child in danger, nor would he want any priest to go after a child,” Bourgeois said.

Edward Mahoney, a professor of religious studies at St. Michael’s College, said the decision to retire must have been a difficult one for the pope to make. He, too, expressed admiration of the pope’s acknowledgment that he would not be able to carry out the demands of the papacy, Mahoney said — “physically, spiritually and mentally.”

“Like everybody, it really came as a big surprise,” Mahoney said, calling the decision “very rare and very unusual but not unprecedented.”

The most recent resignation occurred in the early 1400s, when Pope Gregory XII stepped down. It was a time of great difficulty and division in the church, Mahoney said. “He resigned in order to try to bring unity to the church.”

It is possible the pope’s successor will be in place by Easter, as the procedure can be expedited in the event of resignation as opposed to death, Mahoney said. He suggests the qualities the cardinals might look for encompass “someone who has strong theological and intellectual skills, who is deeply spiritual and has the physical ability to be able to continue in office with a certain energy and vibrancy.”

In addition to dealing with the immediate issues facing the Catholic Church, the next pope will have to address the broader needs of the church in the world, Mahoney said. These include discussions of peace, war and the environment, “all of which Benedict the 16th spoke very frankly about.”

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Monsignor Michael DeForge, who serves at St. Catherine Siena Church in Shelburne, said a “sense of shock is pretty universal” surrounding the pope’s announcement.

He has been a father in Vermont for 33 years and became a monsignor last fall — elevated to that position by the Vatican with Bourgeois, the Rice principal.

DeForge said he has “great trust in the prayer of the man” that the pope’s resignation is the right decision.

“I think we can have great hope in the presence of God to guide the church to what it needs for history’s moment,” he said. “I think the church obviously needs something of his great intellect and sense of rootedness and groundedness in tradition.”

In addition, DeForge said, he senses the cardinals will look for a pope who can “relate to the world of the 21st century.”

This means a person with a global outlook and perspective, he said. “The global nature of the church will be spotlighted during this next month as leaders of various regions from around the world come together and seek a sense of unity and a sense of future,” DeForge said.

Anne Clark is a professor of religion at the University of Vermont. Her expertise is the Middle Ages.

She thought of that history Monday, the stories of the early centuries of the Catholic Church, Clark said. There were several papal resignations in the Middle Ages; in none of them was a personal incapacity or failing cited, Clark said.

“It’s always very clearly around competing factions within the church, controversies and how they’re being addressed,” Clark said.

“This is an interesting modern thing we might see more of as life spans are lengthened,” she said. “None of that is to suggest there aren’t real political and ecclesiastical controversies, and even crises, in the current case. (Yet) his resignation is cast in terms of the personal.”

As a monsignor who works with Catholic students, Bourgeois said it is important that Benedict’s successor is devoted to the “spiritual journey of the church.”

He stressed, as well, the importance of a leader who is “mindful of the suffering of the world and can direct the church’s resources” to places of need around the globe.

The next pope “needs to be comfortable speaking on the world stage about poverty and oppression that goes on in the world,” Bourgeois said. “Regardless of the scandals, the world often still looks to the church as a moral voice. And we need that voice to be out there speaking.”